Al Mezan Condemns the Israeli Approval of the 'Shalit Law” Bill and Calls for Intensifying International Efforts to Abolish this Racist Law

On Sunday evening, 23 May 2010, the Israeli Mini-Cabinet approved the 'Shalit Law” bill, which imposes harsher measures on the conditions of detention for Palestinian detainees in Israeli prisons.
Al Mezan Centre for Human Rights condemns the Israeli Cabinet’s approval of the new law.
Al Mezan calls for intensifying the international efforts to abolish this law as it violates the human rights of Palestinian prisoners and the United Nations Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners and the basic rights of Palestinian detainees in the Israeli prisons.
    The new law, which was approved on Sunday 23 May 2010, deprives Palestinian detainees of visits by lawyers and families and limits the visits by Red Cross representatives to one every three months.
It also deprives detainees of their right to continue their education in prison and prohibits detainees from watching TV, reading books and magazines, and the use of canteen services.
Under this law, Palestinian detainees are subject to unlimited periods of solitary confinement as a punishment procedure.
  Under this bill, and if approved by the Israeli Knesset, Palestinian detainees will become  hostages whereby the Israeli authorities can blackmail Palestinian factions and use prisoners as a bargaining chip to exert pressure on them; especially as the bill proposes that the procedures would only applicable to members of any group that holds or participates in holding Israelis.
  According to the estimations of a researcher working on detainee issues, Mr.
Abdel Nasir Farwana, there are about 7,000 Palestinian detainees held in Israeli prisons and detention centers.
735 of those are from the Gaza Strip.
Since 2006, families in Gaza have not been able to visit their relatives in Israeli prisons.
Palestinian detainees are subject to systematic Israeli violations of their basic rights.
Despite the international condemnation of the Israeli violations against Palestinian detainees, Israel has continued its violations against them.
The Israeli acts only show Israel’s disregard for the international community and for its legal obligations under the International Humanitarian Law and International Human Rights Law.
  Al Mezan emphasizes the inherent right of detainees to enjoy their rights, particularly the right to a fair trial, economic, social and cultural rights, and the right not to be subject to torture and abuse.
Al Mezan emphasizes the right of detainees to communicate with people outside the prison, including their right to family visits.
  Al Mezan deplores this proposed law for effectively turning Palestinian detainees into hostages.
Al Mezan strongly condemns the systematic ill-treatment of Palestinian detainees by Israel, which deprives detainees of their basic rights in violation of the UN Standards on the Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners, the Convention against Torture, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the Convention on the Rights of the Child and other international conventions.
  Al Mezan calls on the international community to exert pressure on Israel to respect its obligations under international law and to abolish this bill before it comes into force.
In this context, Al Mezan calls for an international campaign to expose the increased Israeli violations, particularly the discriminatory nature of this proposed law.
  Ends